Last 30 Days, Staal and Corvo Top Guns in League

If you have been following the Carolina Hurricanes lately, you certainly know that Eric Staal and Joe Corvo have been playing very well during the past several games. But did you know that over the last 30 days, they both lead the entire league in scoring for their respective positions?

I have been quoting James Mirtle’s site quite a bit here lately, but this is another item that is both newsworthy and Hurricanes related. Periodically, James posts a chart that reviews the top scoring players in the league over the past 30 day period. Here are his most recent findings, dated March 15.

Forwards G A Pts +/- PIM

1 Alexander Ovechkin 9 12 21 5 6

2 Derek Roy 8 12 20 5 8

3 Eric Staal 6 14 20 7 14

4 Jason Pominville 8 11 19 6 4

5 Alexei Kovalev 5 14 19 3 18

6 Mats Sundin 8 10 18 5 32

7 Evgeni Malkin 6 12 18 5 18

8 Jarome Iginla 9 8 17 8 18

9 Ilya Kovalchuk 9 6 15 4 8

10 Pavel Datsyuk 8 7 15 1 6

Defensemen G A Pts +/- PIM

1 Dion Phaneuf 3 9 12 7 54

2 Kimmo Timonen 1 11 12 6 14

3 Joe Corvo 3 8 11 6 4

4 Braydon Coburn 4 6 10 7 14

5 Sergei Gonchar 2 8 10 7 8

6 Zdeno Chara 7 4 11 5 23

7 Sami Salo 3 4 7 8 6

8 Mark Streit 3 10 13 1 10

9 Brian Campbell 3 9 12 2 8

10 Duncan Keith 3 4 7 7 4

As James mentions in his posting, if the study had been completed a day later and if the games played on the 16th counted, Corvo’s hat-trick would have put him in first position for defensemen. What Mirtle doesn’t mention is that Staal’s three assists earned in that same game, gave him 23 total points and also would have jumped him up over Derek Roy and Alexander Ovechkin for first place in the league for forwards, as well.

Corvo’s outstanding performance on Sunday earned him first-star honors at NHL.com Sunday night, as well as player-of-the-day status for Monday at NHLPA.com.

Staal has played extremely well in all facets of the game lately, especially over the past 15 games when team captain Rod Brind’Amour was lost to knee surgery. The all-star center has five three-point games in his last 10 played. I expect that he will continue to be on Mirtle’s list for at least a couple of more weeks to come.